I got a chase freedom card which I should get $200 cash back after spending $500 in three months - I just met that and am waiting to see how that works out.
If you have future travel plans, NEVER redeem the points from that for cash. Why? Well you can apply for a Chase Sapphire Preferred sometime in the future, and transfer your points on your Freedom to your Sapphire Preferred, and then from there to airline partners, where you can use them for much better than just 1 cent per point (which is what you'd get if your redeemed them for cash on your Freedom).
and I just got a barclaycard arrival plus which will get me 40,000 miles which kind of intimidates me as I am not sure about redeeming them, but I do know if it is too complicated I can redeem them for about $250 cash...so....not bad either way. I do need to spend $3000 in three months though which may be tough without manufactured spending which I am still not sure about....
To get the full value your your barclaycard arrival+ "miles" (I use quotes because they're not transferrable to airline partners) is to put travel charges on your card (the terms and conditions define them in detail, but based on merchant codes its airlines, hotels, trains, buses, car rentals, etc), and then you can use your miles as a statement credit against the travel charge. So just wait for your next trip, and then use your miles then.
If you use your miles against non-travel charges, you get a much lower value for your points, I believe 0.5 cents per mile.
To meet minimum spend:
1) Sign up for an Amex Serve. It's a reloadable debit card. You can load with credit cards without a fee from Amex. The credit card issuer
may issue a cash advance, but as of now, Barclaycard does not treat the transaction as a cash advance. For the latest, see
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/manufactured-spending/1199432-serve-another-paypal-amazon-payments-555.html You can load $1000/month through this method ($1500/month if you sign up for the serve through Softcard, but that requries you have a NFC enabled phone on AT&T, Verizon, or T-Mobile).
2) Buy gift cards for stores you already shop at (this effectively gives you more time to spend the required amount, but it's not a "true spend" like the next option)
3) Buy Visa or Mastercard prepaid gift cards. Usually you can find $500 ones for ~$5 fee. Then you can load them onto a Serve at Walmart for free, or if that isn't viable for you, just spend them down over time. Once it's on the Serve, you can use the bill pay function to pay the credit card you used to buy the gift cards.
You may incur some fees for minimum spend. But if that's the only way for you to meet minimum spend, then its absolutely worth it. To do it on an ongoing basis is another story.